U.S. trade gap widens, jobless claims still high - lower euro good news for EU exporters
In a sign of continued weakness in the U.S. labor market, the number of U.S. workers collecting jobless benefits shot up by 122,000 to 3.53 million in the week ended Aug. 30, the highest level since October 2003.
Financial market traders mostly ignored the reports, focusing instead on the fate of the beleaguered financial services firm Lehman Brothers and a drop in crude oil futures prices toward $100 per barrel. The monthly trade gap swelled to $62.2 billion, the largest since March 2007, as average oil import prices leaped 6.4 percent to $124.66 per barrel and the volume of oil imports jumped 15 percent to 342 million barrels, the highest since June 2004.
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